JD Durkin: Welcome back to the broadcast. Joining me now here at Money20/20, Robert Stevenson, chief commercial officer at ZeroTier. Also joining the conversation, the great Dalia Kamar, head of investor and startup programs at Money20/20. Robert, Dalia, my special thanks to both of you. Thanks for being here today.
Robert Stevenson: Thank you for having us.
JD Durkin: Robert, I’ll kick things off with you. First of all, congratulations. You won the big Money20/20 startup pitch competition. What does this recognition mean to you? What does it mean to the team at ZeroTier?
Robert Stevenson: Oh, it’s excellent. We have just entered the finance space with a very cool platform and product. It’s very forward-looking, and this is just validation. It’s also super exciting because we’re among a huge peer group of other innovators and people just trying to find and carve a new path in fintech, AI, quantum, all these kinds of things. So it’s super special, and the team back home is cheering away.
JD Durkin: So that’s awesome. Congratulations again. Dalia, for you: what is the goal? How would you define the overall purpose of this year’s competition? I know there are a lot of tough competitors out there. What made this team stand out in particular?
Dalia Kamar: Well, first, congrats, Robert. I think you heard it there. I think it’s finding the right time and place to bring together the best founders in fintech. We have over 900 startups here, so it is quite difficult, and some of them really are building things that you wouldn’t even imagine, like Robert’s team here. So the purpose is, how do we bring founders, funders, and the wider ecosystem together? And my job is really to make that collision happen very intentionally. And, you know, congrats again for getting to the top.
JD Durkin: And Dalia, you work with fintech startups not just here in the US, but all around the world. Talk to me about the top trends that have emerged in the space over the last year, and any big surprises that have emerged as well.
Dalia Kamar: Definitely. So Money20/20 is a platform. We have now expanded across six shows, and the program that we have is, you know, not drag-and-drop. Every market is so unique. And part of our job is, how do we make something standardized, so the infrastructure behind this program feels the same, but it’s very localized to what the market needs, what the founders need, what the venture ecosystem looks like.
And so some of the biggest trends we’re really seeing are, you know, AI, a lot of, or should I say [unclear: “see”], now that we’re here in the US, cybersecurity. We have a lot of companies that are looking at parallel verticals and bringing that into, you know, a more financially inclusive space. So I’m really excited to see how these founders grow across our shows. And Robert, I guess I’ll see you at our next show.
Robert Stevenson: Yeah. Sounds like a plan.
JD Durkin: Robert, let me ask you a little bit more about ZeroTier. Walk us through what the core business is, for anyone who might be a bit unfamiliar.
Robert Stevenson: Yeah. So we do cloud-based infrastructure, and our platform basically is designed to connect people, places, and devices seamlessly. So all kinds of complex connectivity situations: [unclear: “foreign”] networks, hybrid cloud, multi-cloud, [unclear: “dense”], high-availability site-to-site. And the cool thing with the new platform, ZeroTier Quantum, which is what we’re showcasing here at the show and which we announced back in March, is that it’s post-quantum secure.
And so we’re looking at PQC mandates coming down on the defense side, on the government side, and recently in the finance space. So SWIFT has announced their PQC plans, and most recently, the Treasury has formed a task force. And so post-quantum readiness in the financial markets is going to become a very, very big thing over the next couple of years, before a cryptographically relevant quantum computer arrives and can be hacking away at your key data.
JD Durkin: Wow. Make this make sense a little bit more for me and our viewers, because we see a lot of headlines surrounding quantum. I don’t know how many people have quite had it make sense just yet: the future of quantum computing threats. How big is the risk, and how specifically is ZeroTier prepared to help?
Robert Stevenson: Yeah. So it’s a giant risk. As you sign into your bank today, a typical person picks up their phone, and they’re, you know, Face ID-ing into the bank. That’s going over an encryption standard that’s been around for three decades, and that encryption standard can be broken when quantum computers arrive. They’re expected to arrive in 2029, maybe 2030. And so no link, nothing, can be left unprotected, right? Because through just any backdoor, somebody can come in and start potentially sniffing or hacking or stealing data.
And so you think about the scope across every system, and just take a large bank, a very large one, right? And the risk is not maybe that somebody’s going after somebody’s specific bank account right away. The risk is the grandiose risk of, you know, hey, stealing the New York Stock Exchange ledger, right? Something like that, something really, really big. And the challenge is that migrating your cryptography across all your systems, in a large bank, even a small credit union, or across a fintech on payment rails, these are multi-month, multiyear projects. These are not small projects.
And so what we do is we provide a network overlay that goes from point to point, no matter what your topology is, no matter what your situation is, and it’s post-quantum secure. And so we immediately give you, you know, NSA’s highest-level security standards, the same security standards that defense and government are recommending, and we give that to you instantly using our product.
JD Durkin: Dalia, you know better than anyone the things that investors are looking for in fintechs overall. Talk to me about a few of those considerations that you have noticed in this space.
Dalia Kamar: Definitely. I think you hit the nail on the head there, Robert. How do we look at existing industries and verticals and think, who will be vulnerable here, and how can we build these, you know, products and services that are going to help us all move forward? So for our sake, you know, at Money20/20, we try to bring these founders into the equation, go to our funders, go to our VCs, our private equity guys, our private credit guys, and ask them, you know, what is it about these companies that stands out to you? A lot of times, it’s about not just them finding great founders like Robert and his team here, but about finding each other.
And, you know, we launched this year at Money20/20 a special kind of engagement for investors called Capital Tables, bringing those LPs and GPs together. And you’d be surprised: near and far, they’re all talking about the same thing. How do they stay relevant, because of how quickly founders are building, at a very rapid speed?
JD Durkin: That’s awesome. Let me say a huge thank you to you and everyone here associated with Money20/20. There’s really no event quite like this. We’re so grateful to be a part, so thank you. And a huge congratulations to you, Robert. What a huge honor here at the event in Vegas. And I’m really thankful to both of you for your time and for being here.
Robert Stevenson: Thanks a lot.
Dalia Kamar: Thank you so much. Have a great day.
